


...and I Can't See the Water: A Story of the Ninth Bookkeeper

by Geonn



Series: The Bookkeeper's Archive [4]
Category: Doctor Who (2005), Original Work, Warehouse 13
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/F, F/M, First Time, Happy Ending, References to Suicide, Sad, Suicidal Thoughts, Time Travel, Virginity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-18
Updated: 2012-11-18
Packaged: 2017-11-18 22:21:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/565902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Geonn/pseuds/Geonn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Born in flame, the Ninth Bookkeeper goes on a final trip before regenerating into a new, unscarred body.</p>
            </blockquote>





	...and I Can't See the Water: A Story of the Ninth Bookkeeper

**Author's Note:**

> Related to Book's Story, which serves as a primer for this series, but it's not necessary to have read it to understand the story. The Bookkeeper is a Time Lord who hunts down rare books for the Library, which was seen in "Silence in the Library" and "Forests of the Dead." A cheat-sheet for the character can be found here: http://geonncannon.livejournal.com/1626938.html 
> 
> Title (and inspiration) from David Bowie's "Conversation Piece." Listen to the version from the album 'Toy' if you can. It's highly superior to the original IMO.

Like most of the other Time Lords, I tended to stay away from Earth. It was a boring part of the galaxy. And not only that, there was only life on a single planet in their solar system. One planet inhabited and eight vacant. In most corners of the universe we call that a slum. We also avoided it because _he_ had decided it was his playground and the people who lived there were his pets. Time and again, he would drop by and either cause or prevent some massive problem and it was easier to just stay away from the planet altogether. 

Unfortunately the sheer volume of literature produced by its inhabitants meant I had to visit it from time to time in order to keep the Library comprehensive. I arranged my visits carefully, staying away from the big moments when that blasted physician might make an appearance. He rarely showed up on Sundays or Tuesdays or Thursday afternoons. Aside from the occasional jaunt to America, he tended to stay in the UK. 

So I timed my arrival in Spain on a rainy Tuesday in the late eighteen hundreds. My TARDIS filled an empty lot next to a furniture store and stepped out into the haze of the downpour. I turned up the collar of my coat, black wool with a high collar and a single large black button at the throat and tugged my cap down lower over my face. The collar helped obscure the burns on my throat and jaw and I burrowed into it like a security blanket.

I hadn't been a proper agent of the Library since my most recent rebirth, but the Librarian was more than understanding. My last death had been traumatic even by Time Lord standards; burnt at the stake by the illiterate masses of a planet called Whileaway. I was imprisoned, tortured, beaten, for the sole crime of asking about a book. I was finally sentenced to a public execution and my jailors tied me to a stake and set me aflame. My Eighth body died from the smoke, and my new Ninth body was scarred as I made my escape. I could have used my regeneration energy to smooth the wounds out again, but I wanted them as reminders of that blasted planet, of what I had been through. 

But now I was ready to move on. I was ready to heal and continue on my mission, but I knew it would require a new regeneration. I had to heal my scars, I had to change the dark-eyed and black-haired woman who greeted me in the mirror every morning. I mourned my Eighth self but also my Ninth. She'd never had a life of her own, not really, forced instead to wear the widow's weeds of who I'd once been. Her existence had been long and solitary and sad. Before I forced the regeneration, I wanted to give her the best of what life had to offer for once.

Spain, even in the rain (which falls everywhere, not just on the plain, Eliza you twit), was absolutely gorgeous. I took the tour of an ancient church and stood on the parapet, the wind swirling the tails of my coat around my legs as I looked at the churning water of the sea far ahead of me. My hands were cold, even in gloves and shoved into my pockets. I breathed deep the scent of salt, sand, and ozone before I went to work.

My goal was a chapbook purportedly written by H.G. Wells in 1900 and left in a Spanish church. It was mentioned in a letter from the woman who found it to her mother living in Belgium, with far too much plot and character information to have been a flight of fancy. There were never any other references to the book, so in order to maintain the Library's flawless record, I had to find a copy at the sole point in history it seemed to have existed. 

I had always loved this part of my mission; investigating, digging through the past, following a book from one reader to the next. Used bookshops were a nexus that books passed through, like living beings with a final destination in mind. Very often that final destination was the Library. 

I watched as the ocean twisted and cascaded against itself. The winds were picking up, so strong now that it was dangerous to be standing on this ledge. I smiled, amused at a Lady of Time being concerned about falling to her death. Ironic at the best times, when this particular Lady was planning suicide, being careful was actually counterintuitive. 

Regardless I turned away from the spectacular view and went back down the winding narrow staircase to begin my work.

#

 _Rain_. Helena Wells thought the word like a curse, holding back the curtain to watch the sheets of water course down the glass of her bedroom window. _Another day of bloody rain._ She thought she'd left the storm clouds back in England. Still, she could handle a little moisture. She left because she needed to get away from people, not the weather. And what was the saying? One must bear the storm if they desire a rainbow? 

She was on a solo mission, seeking Teresa of Avila's Statue of Jesus. It was purported to hold miraculous powers for expecting mothers, and she sincerely hoped that it would prove just as potent for grieving mothers. She'd taken her vengeance but the past couldn't be altered. She made her decision before leaving England; this would be her final Artifact, the last trip she made at the behest of the Warehouse. If it alleviated her sorrow, she would hand in her resignation and travel the world looking for anything that would take her mind off Christina.

Just thinking the sacred name was enough to bring fresh tears to her eyes. She had been thousands of miles away at the time, and then she tore apart the fabric of reality to prevent the tragedy from ever happening. And she had failed. 

The patter of the rain increased against the roof, loud enough now to drown out her thoughts with white noise. She looked toward the writing desk in the corner and decided to get the odious task done with as soon as possible, and there was no time like the present. She pulled out the chair and sat down, opening the book and smoothing down the title page before taking pen to hand. She wrote across the top line, titling what she could only think of as her final work. Even if she chose life, she doubted she would ever put pen to paper again.

The words appeared across the vellum page like thin dark ribbons: "The Last Will and Testament of Helena G. Wells."

#

The TARDIS records were coy about the life of one Herbert George Wells. After a fair amount of cross-referencing and digging through records, I discovered that there were reports of an H.G. Wells being active in the twenty-first century. After a quick pass-through of the time period in question I discovered that the writer was in fact Helena Wells', Herbert's little-known sister. It made sense, as her novels became popular in a time they would have been ignored with a woman's name on the cover. It was a maddening trend; Charlotte Bronte published _Jane Eyre_ under the name of Currer Bell, but at least she had eventually been properly lauded for her talents when the truth came out. Where was the justice for Helena?

A light was burning in the small room above a grocer, the curtains gently wafting with the movement of someone within. I entered the store under the guise of a potential customer whose main purpose was to escape the downpour. My hair was lank and hung like a raven's wings in front of my burn-twisted face. I kept my head down as I moved through the aisles and pretended to examine the produce as I looked about.

A flight of stairs at the back of the shop led up to a second floor. A sign at eye level the newel post revealed rooms were available for three-hundred and fifty pesetas per night. I had a bit of the local currency in the event I was forced to buy the book from whoever had it, so I approached the clerk and asked about renting. He eagerly took my money and escorted me upstairs, all the while extolling the virtues of the room. 

When I arrived I immediately saw that half the features he promised were impossible, but I thanked him anyway and told him it would suit me nicely. He revealed the cost of the room included a breakfast cooked by his wife Josefina. My ears perked up at that; the woman who discovered the lost H.G. Wells chapbook was called Josefina. I thanked him and took off my jacket, revealing the ash-gray blouse underneath. I found the towels where the clerk-slash-concierge said they would be and dried my hair. I pushed it back over the slope of my skull and let it hang, turning my head to examine my cheek and throat.

I had stopped seeing the burns about a hundred years in, but I was fully aware of them. My right ear was a gnarled mess, though I could still hear perfectly. A web of scars crisscrossed the column of my throat and spread across my collar. I stroked it with my finger, pushing down the collar of my blouse. My Ninth body was gorgeous even with the scars; I wondered how she would have fared romantically if I had been unblemished, if I had used my regeneration to smooth out my wounds when they were still fresh.

A knock on the door startled me. I raked my hair forward and let it hang over my scars as I crossed the room in three long strides.

"Yes, hello?"

"Ah, a fellow Brit. My name is Helena. I'm having a bit of a problem with my writing supplies running low."

My mouth was dry. I glanced toward the window, then rested my palm against the wood. "Um... sure. What do you need?"

"An ink well, if you have it. Seems I've got quite a bit to say. More than I expected."

I dropped my hand to the brass knob, hesitated, and then opened the door just enough to look out. The writer was beautiful, with small dark eyes and the quick smile of a snake-oil salesman. She smiled, and I made sure I kept sure of where her hands were at all times. After my initial sense of mistrust, partially due to being biased by her future biography, I recognized something in her eye. Sorrow, pain, loss. She recognized the same in me, I think, because her expression shifted ever-so-slightly. She angled her head slightly, and her eyes narrowed even further, her hands loosely clasped in front of her.

"I don't think I have anything that could help you. I could look, if you don't mind waiting a moment."

"Not at all." I invited her in with a tick of my head, leaving the door open as I crossed the room to my coat. I turned out the pockets, dropping the contents onto the bed as I sought the prize. Buttons, an empty thread bobbin, two jacks, a red bouncy ball, a plastic soldier, ten pence, three right-handed rubber gloves, one left-handed rubber glove, a sheriff's star, a charcoal pencil, a detonator (oh, bollocks, I need to get that back to him...), seven chopsticks, and an ink pen that was anachronistic for the time period. I hid the last and apologetically offered her the pencil. "I'm afraid this is all I've got."

"Ah. Well, I suppose my work can wait until a stationary shop is open. Sorry for bothering you."

"Please... wait." She stopped at the doorway. I don't know why I stopped her. My purpose was to retrieve her book, which I couldn't very well do if she wasn't finished writing it. But something about that initial moment of recognition made me foolhardy. I wet my lips and gestured at the room. "No sense in the two of us being alone in two tiny rooms. Would you like some company? If you're not going to be writing you might as well socialize."

She squared her shoulders and lifted her chin. Again, that smile. But it wasn't one of humor or delight. It was more a pantomime of the expression, a parody by someone who had once known how to do it properly but was no longer able. She nodded once and said, "Yes. That would be lovely, I think." She closed the door and faced me again. "I told you my name... what's yours?"

"I'm the Bookkeeper. But you can call me Book."

This time there was some true happiness in her smile. "Oh, I can tell we're going to get along famously already, Madame Book."

Somehow we both knew that pleasantries weren't necessary. I sat on the bed while Helena turned around the chair from the writing desk and faced me. When I asked what brought her to Spain, she looked toward the window and saw something far more distant than the shoreline. "Grief," she said, "and sorrow, and tragedy. And far too much pain. And yourself?"

"One final attempt at making a difference before I surrender to fate."

She nodded sagely. She told me she was a writer and I asked about her books, feigning ignorance as she told me none of them had sold. She told me stories about characters I recognized as Dr. Moreau and Griffin the invisible man (she gave his first name as Nigel and assured me he was based upon a friend of an acquaintance) and I, in turn, told her about my adventures in archiving. 

An hour into our conversation she stood to stretch her back, and I offered her a side of the bed. She hesitated briefly before sitting on the edge of the mattress and bending forward to take off her boots. She pushed herself higher on the mattress, pillow against her hips and her shoulders on the headboard, and she rested both hands on her stomach as she faced me. We simply stared at each other for long moments, speech unnecessary. She lifted her hand, crooked a finger, and brushed aside my now-dry hair to reveal my face. I flinched away but she kept her hand where it was.

"May I ask?" she whispered, making it clear by her tone that I could refuse.

"A man I... was very close to was burned alive."

"Did you try to save him?"

"No. It was impossible, but I... was caught in the flames as well. I felt him die. I barely escaped with my own life. The scars, I keep as reminders of what almost happened. Of the person I lost that day. But I think I'm finally ready to stop wearing them."

Helena grew very still, and I realized I'd let myself become too relaxed. I had forgotten she wasn't a Time Lord, she didn't know that death, to us, was only a new awakening. I parted my lips to clarify what I meant, stumbling over my words, but Helena put a slender finger across them to silence me.

"I'm here for the same reason, Book."

I was stunned. "What do you mean?"

She looked down toward our feet, and I moved my hand. My smallest finger brushed her thumb, and she twisted her wrist to press our palms flat together. It was a long time before she spoke, and when she did her voice was a whisper. I felt as though my little room above the shop was cut off from the rest of the world and time, hidden even from God, and what she was about to say was meant for me alone.

"I lost my daughter. Christina. I tried to stop it. I fashioned a device with which I could travel through time to make amends. But I failed. I could only exact vengeance on the men responsible, which changed nothing. They were trained to expect death, so it was of no consequence to them. It did nothing to ease my own suffering. So now I am on a quest to do one final job. If I succeed, then I will find a way to go on. If I fail..."

I sat up and touched Helena's face. I knew that she lived on, that she was somehow still alive a century from this moment, but I couldn't explain to her how I'd come to have that knowledge. I cupped her cheek and Helena touched her finger to my chin.

"Go on, Helena."

"I was finished."

"No," I said with a smile. "You must go on. You must continue... living. The destruction of who you are won't bring back your daughter. You must keep her alive, here." I touched her chest just above her heart with two fingers and then flattened my palm over the smooth material of her shirt. "And you must remain alive as well. You're a flame, Helena, and your daughter was a spark. It was a damnable tragedy that her light was extinguished, but by killing yourself you'd only be finishing the job they started. Don't let them win. Keep Christina alive."

She smiled and covered my hand with hers, then leaned toward me. I accepted her kiss without thinking what it would mean in this time, with the mores of her generation. I'd had female lovers as both genders, so it wasn't as shocking as she'd so clearly intended it to be. I slipped my tongue across her bottom lip and she captured it, sucking it into her mouth. When she released it she flicked the tip of her tongue against my bottom lip and kissed both sides of my mouth, the smooth side and then lingering on the corner that was puckered slightly by burns.

"You're gorgeous, you know? And brilliant."

"You're the expert in both, I wager."

She brushed her nose against mine. "You speak as if you know me."

I kissed her cheek, then her ear. "Everyone knows the name H.G. Wells. It's just a pity they honor the wrong person." I took her earlobe into my mouth and sucked, and her fingers tugged gently at the large buttons of my blouse. I ran my lips across the smooth column of her neck as I shrugged and the material was pushed down my arms, baring the crossed straps of my underwear. Only after Helena began searching for the clasp did I realize it had been designed on a different world.

"Ah, the..." I gasped. "My undergarments are a unique design." I lifted up and guided her hands. She undid the button, dragged down the zipper, and her fingers smoothed across the bare skin of my back. She moved her lips across my burn-scarred cheek, not close enough to touch but I could sense her, could feel her breath against the ruined skin. 

"May I?"

I put my hand on the back of her head and guided it forward. She kissed my cheek and I gasped, eyed closed as she kissed the damage I had lived with for so long. My brow furrowed I discarded my underwear, my soft breasts flattened by the comparatively coarse material of her blouse. My nipples hardened as she explored, tracing trails with her tongue, and I rolled myself on top of her. I hadn't had made love since a year before my immolation. Some Time Lords could go a millennium without sex, but six hundred years seemed to be my limit.

I put my hands on the pillow on either side of her head, situated between her thighs. I was kneeling upon her skirt, the material pulled tight across her thighs. Her cheeks were flush, and black hair stuck to the sweat that had popped up on her forehead in the past few seconds. I moved my hands to brace her head and stroked her hair with my fingertips.

"Have you ever done this before?"

"As a matter of fact I have." Her voice was husky as she lowered her hands to my hips, lifting the hem of my shirt to tickle the soft skin just above the waistband of my trousers. I pulled my lips back from my teeth, growling playfully as she teased, and she lifted her head off the pillow. I bowed to meet her, my lips pushing hers apart, tongues meeting teeth, and her teasing strokes became more to the point. 

We found a delicate balance between kissing, touching, and the necessary evil of clothing removal. When her lips found my nipple and closed around it, I had a sudden and potentially shocking realization. I pressed my hand against the side of her head, angling her back until she was looking up at me. 

"I've technically never done this before."

"Of course not, darling," she whispered. "It's all right. It's not a bad thing, not at all. I know we've just met, but I knew the moment you opened that door we had a connection."

I realized I had forgotten the planet and era I was in. Virginity wasn't unusual here and now, and Sapphic love was even more taboo. She stroked my face lovingly and pulled me to her for another kiss. Her lips parted in anticipation and I covered them with mine. She moaned softly and then spoke against my chin.

"I'm honored to be your first lover, Book."

We finished undressing each other, and Helena stroked my hair and sobbed quietly as I lowered my head to her sex. I teased her with my tongue, drawing back only when I felt her nearing climax in order to prolong the experience. I finally relented when her cries of passion became quiet gasps of "Please, please, Book, I must." I used my tongue on her clit, my fingers between her folds, and I urged her quickly to a shattering orgasm. My hearing was spared only by her thighs closing around my head, blocking my ears, but I was sure our hosts would have something to say in the morning.

I moved up her body like smoke, turning my head to kiss one breast and then the other before kissing her again. Her hands roamed my body and I straddled her thigh, settling heavily on it as she pushed back onto the mattress. We thrust against each other and I sat up, shoulders hunched as she stared up at me. I rolled my head back and Helena put her hands on my stomach, pushing up to stroke my breasts. She pinched my nipples between her fingers and the mixture of pain and arousal shot through me. 

I pressed my wrist into my mouth and bit down on it, stifling my own cries until I melted down onto Helena's waiting body. She held me, stroked me, ran her tongue over skin that was both smooth and scarred. I lifted my head and she kissed my closed eyes, my lashes fluttering against her lips. She pushed my head up, using her hands to hold my hair out of my face. Her eyebrow was arched in amused suspicion.

"That was not your first dance, my dear." 

"Would that be a compliment on my technique?"

She laughed and pulled me to her. We made love again, our cries becoming louder as the storm grew quiet outside the windows. Finally I cried mercy and curled up beside her, and she wrapped her arms around me. She stroked me from shoulder to elbow, her foot running along my right leg from knee to ankle, and I closed my eyes, enveloped in her. She kissed my neck and asked again how I could possibly be virginal.

I rolled onto my back and looked at her. Hair that hung like a velvet rope in front of her eyes dropped down and landed on my face, and I smiled as I tucked it behind her ear.

"I'm an alien," I said to her. "A Lady of Time from the planet Gallifrey. When I die, I regenerate a new form. This is my Ninth body. I've never made love to anyone in this body."

To her credit, Helena missed not a note. "And the man you lost to fire...?"

"My previous incarnation."

"Of course." She smiled and touched my unmarred cheek. "Lady of Time," she whispered with no small amount of jealousy. "What I wouldn't give..."

I stroked her hip under the blanket. "Would you like to come with me?"

"What?"

I pushed myself up on my elbows. "I've mourned long enough. It's time for me to become someone new, someone who can bury the past and continue my mission for the Library. Before, I took great joy in my assignments. I traveled with clerks who could assist me while they explored the universe. The manner of my death and rebirth has haunted me for long enough." I picked up her hand and brought it to my lips. "Come with me, Helena Wells. Find your solace among the stars. And when you're ready, I can bring you back here and you can begin your life anew. Pick up the pieces and live your life."

She looked awestruck. I wondered if a part of her thought I'd been lying before I made the invitation. Finally she said, "I could write." She kissed my hand, our fingers intertwined. "I wanted to take my life because I couldn't bear the thought of..." She bit her bottom lip. "I can be punished for my crimes. It's called Bronzing. But I was terrified of being conscious all that time without the ability to write, without exploring." She paused for a long moment. "But perhaps if I wrote while I was with you... I could write and then have Herbert release the books over the next few decades. And then I might be at peace enough to serve my sentence."

I nodded and she kissed me again. Her lips moved against mine.

"Take me with you, my Lady of Time."

I pulled her to me and promised I would. But there was one thing I needed to do first.

#

"You're sure?"

Helena was wrapped in a velvet cloak, only her chalk-white face visible through the ring of fake fur of the hood. I wore my gray blouse and slacks, my coat draped over a rock nearby. I nodded and turned to face her. 

"You can travel with me to exorcise your demons. But I see my demons every time I look at my face. This was my mourning gown. I need to change it if I'm ever to move on." I cupped her cheek and smiled. "I'll do my best to remain attractive for you, love."

She laughed. "I'm very open-minded. Do your worst."

I kissed her for a long moment and then looked at the horizon over my shoulder. The storm clouds had moved out over the ocean, obscuring the sunrise in the most beautiful fashion. I felt wetness on my hand and turned to see Helena crying. I brushed the tears away and shushed her, stepping closer. 

"Love. Don't cry."

"You're killing yourself. I can't believe you'll just be reborn until I've seen it with my own eyes. I'm only human, remember."

"Right." I kissed away her tears, licking the salty tracks and then kissing her eyelids. 

I let go of her hand and walked away from her. I didn't look back; we'd said our goodbyes. All that remained was my ending and new beginning. The waves leapt up, eager for me, and slammed against my thighs hard enough to nearly topple me over. I fought against the current, my clothes instantly soaked to my body. When they were at my chest, I held my breath out of sheer habit and dove forward. The next wave crashed over my head and pushed me down into the deep.

I won't bore you with what happened next. The shimmering light of regeneration looked bloody marvy underwater, mixing with the aqua green-blue and reflecting off the scales of fish that came to see what I was all about. I lost consciousness and, I suppose, died from lack of oxygen. What felt like seconds later I broke the surface, coughing with a voice as rough as sandpaper, clawing for air as I fought against the current I had just willingly given myself over to. I leveled out and swam, desperately kicking and clawing at the water until I felt a sandbar under my feet. 

I coughed the salt water from my lungs, my clothes now tight on my newly male body. I tugged at the buttons until the shirt hung free, still tight between my shoulders. I staggered forward, my vision swimming around the image of a woman in a black cloak walking quickly toward me. I was freezing cold, shivering, confused and confounded until I saw her face and recognized her.

"Helena."

"Book?"

I smiled and stood up straighter. Her eyes were wide with shock and wonder, and she fumbled with her compact. She held it up to me and clicked it open so I could see what my new face looked like. Square jaw, quite liked that. Blonde hair, all jagged and sticky-uppy in the front. Probably due to the drownin' an' all. Kind of small for a bloke, but awright. Definite awright. I ran my finger over the curve of my jaw - lantern, I think they called it, and looked at Helena. I remembered my promises to her and held out my hand.

"Still wanna travel with me, love?"

She took a deep breath and released it with a shudder. "Oh, the possibilities..." She put one hand against her collar, smiling devilishly. I remembered my last incarnation's impression of Helena as a con artist, a grifter. I could definitely see that in her now. But I wasn't concerned. She might have been a con artist, but she didn't know who she was dealin' with. I smiled and took her hand, then scooped up my jacket with the other hand.

"C'mon. I'll show you _my_ time machine."

She let me lead her up the beach. When we reached the road, she turned and looked at me with a mischievous glint in her eye.

"Does this mean you're a virgin again?"

I threw my head back and laughed. Oh, this one was definitely going to be a handful. I couldn't wait to see what trouble she got me into.


End file.
